Watergate Scandal Anniversary Walking Tour - Foggy Bottom (Washington DC)

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June 17 is the 43rd anniversary (1972) of the Watergate break-in that brought down the Nixon Presidency. Remember the great movie “All the President’s Men” with Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman? Let’s take an evening tour past a few of the sites associated with the break-in and scandal as we stroll through Foggy Bottom.

Partial Itinerary

• George Washington University

• Watergate complex – including the former Howard Johnson’s lookout point

• Kennedy Center – including the terrace (not a Watergate site per se but incredible views)

• The White House

• Etc.

This initial weeknight tour received so many RSVP’s we now have three dates to choose from:

6:00 pm – 8:00 pm Saturday, June 13

6:30 pm - 8:30 pm Monday, June 15

6:30 pm – 8:30 pm Wednesday, June 17

The tours will be the same content – just different nights with different groups of people. Please update your RSVP accordingly so we now how many people to expect.

If you are so inclined check out “All the President’s Men” on video before the tour.

This tour is free – however, we will accept donations to cover the administrative costs of maintaining the Meetup site and related expenses.

Thanks!

Robert Kelleman

rkelleman@yahoo.com

202-821-6325

Watergate

The Watergate scandal was a major political scandal that occurred in the United States in the 1970s as a result of the June 17, 1972, break-in at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement. When the conspiracy was discovered and investigated by the U.S. Congress, the Nixon administration's resistance to its probes led to a constitutional crisis. The term Watergate has come to encompass an array of clandestine and often illegal activities undertaken by members of the Nixon administration. Those activities included such "dirty tricks" as bugging the offices of political opponents and people of whom Nixon or his officials were suspicious. Nixon and his close aides ordered harassment of activist groups and political figures, using the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The scandal led to the discovery of multiple abuses of power by the Nixon administration, articles of impeachment, and the resignation of Richard Nixon, the President of the United States. The scandal also resulted in the indictment of 69 people, with trials or pleas resulting in 48 being found guilty and incarcerated, many of whom were Nixon's top administration officials.

The affair began with the arrest of five men for breaking and entering into the DNC headquarters at the Watergate complex on June 17, 1972. The FBI connected cash found on the burglars to a slush fund used by the Committee for the Re-Election of the President (CRP), the official organization of Nixon's campaign. In July 1973, as evidence mounted against the President's staff, including testimony provided by former staff members in an investigation conducted by the Senate Watergate Committee, it was revealed that President Nixon had a tape-recording system in his offices and that he had recorded many conversations. After a protracted series of bitter court battles, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the president had to hand over the tapes to government investigators; he eventually complied. Recordings from these tapes implicated the president, revealing he had attempted to cover up the questionable goings-on that had taken place after the break-in. Facing near-certain impeachment in the House of Representatives and equally certain conviction by the Senate, Nixon resigned the presidency on August 9, 1974. On September 8, 1974, his successor, Gerald Ford, pardoned him.

The name "Watergate" and the suffix "-gate" have since become synonymous with political scandals in the United States and in other English- and non-English-speaking nations.

Foggy Bottom

Foggy Bottom is one of the oldest late 18th and 19th-century neighborhoods in Washington, D.C. The area is thought to have received the name because its riverside location made it susceptible to concentrations of fog and industrial smoke, an atmospheric quirk that did not prevent the neighborhood from becoming the original location of the United States Naval Observatory. Foggy Bottom is west of downtown Washington, in the Northwest quadrant, bounded roughly by 17th Street to the east, Rock Creek Parkway to the west, Constitution Avenue to the south, and Pennsylvania Avenue to the north. Much of Foggy Bottom is occupied by the main campus of George Washington University (GW).

This event is hosted by Robert from the Washington DC History & Culture Meetup group
https://www.meetup.com/DCHistoryAndCulture/
rkelleman@yahoo.com